7 ms·

Michael Crichton: Aliens Cause Global Warming

53 points by gaika 18y ago

bprater 18y ago
I had always wondered how that whole global warming thing happened.
aston 18y ago
Oddly enough, I was at this speech. I left with a lot more respect for Crichton as a scientific thinker, and I almost read the book he was publicizing at the time, Prey.
- Prrometheus 18y ago
  Being a libertarian is good practice for developing this kind of skepticism, as governments often use specious statistics to support their current agenda. Second-hand smoke is one such area, as Crichton mentions. Anti-drug campaigns are also horrible for pulling numbers out of thin air.
  - davidw 18y ago
    It's also good to be skeptical of libertarians denying externalities:-)
    - corentin 18y ago
      Libertarians don't deny externalities; they just recognize that some of them can't be measured.
      - dejb 18y ago
        Just because something can't be accurately measured using current technology doesn't mean it doesn't exist.
        corentin 18y ago
        Which is what I just said...
        dejb 18y ago
        We all seem to be in furious agreement then as that was what the parent post to yours also said.
    - Prrometheus 18y ago
      As a student of economics, I am quite aware of the phenomena of market failure. However, the question to be asked before imposing a new regulation is not "is there a market failure?. Rather, we should ask "is the new regulation likely to do more good than harm?" The central insight of the Public Choice school of economics is that governments are composed of people, and like all people they respond to incentives. Public Choice is widely respected in the Economics profession, though it is generally ignored in public debates. Rather, people have a tendency to assume that the government is composed of perfect angels who will optimally address whatever externalities they are tasked with fixing. There is room for a "good governance" libertarianism, composed solely of economic arguments and with no moral arguments, that would oppose more than 50% of what modern governments do.
jcl 18y ago
He makes some good points, but I think he exaggerates his evidence. In particular, while the Drake equation and TTAPS equation both have unknown terms, at least some of the TTAPS equation terms can be estimated through observation and experimentation -- a far cry from "none of the variables can be determined. None at all." Insisting that a line of inquiry be abandoned simply because it is difficult to measure exact values seems contrary to the investigative spirit of science. Of course, Crichton is correct that we should not be drawing firm conclusions from fuzzy numbers. Likewise, just because many scientists share a consensus about something doesn't mean they are necessarily wrong; scientists share a consensus on the ineffectiveness of Laetrile, the relative harmlessness of aspartame, and the unlikelihood of cell phones causing cancer. These things are hard to prove absolutely, and may even be incorrect in specific circumstances, but in absence of better evidence, a consensus is the best we can have. I found this juxtaposition funny: There is no shortage of other examples. In the 1920s in America, tens of thousands of people, mostly poor, were dying of a disease called pellagra. [...evidence of pellagra as dietary problem...] They continued to deny it until the 1920s. Also this one: When he said it wasn't enough, he put the critics' essays on his web page and answered them in detail. Scientific American threatened copyright infringement and made him take the pages down. [...] Speeches contained on this site are the property of Michael Crichton and may not be reproduced, copied, edited, published, transmitted or uploaded in any way without express permission.
- jfornear 18y ago
  I keep hearing people/journalists say scientists share a consensus, but a simple google query "global warming climatologist" gives you: 1. Climatologists (scientists who study climate) have analyzed the global warming that has occurred since the late 1800's. A small number of scientists argue that the increase in greenhouse gases has not made a measurable difference in the temperature. They say that natural processes could have caused global warming. Those processes include increases in the energy emitted (given off) by the sun. http://www.nasa.gov/worldbook/global_warming_worldbook.html http://www.nasa.gov/worldbook/global_warming_worldbook.html (I know I picked quotes carefully, but that is irrelevant to my argument.) 2. Believe it or not, Global Warming is not due to human contribution. I was as opposed to the threats of impending doom global cooling engendered as I am to the threats made about Global Warming. Let me stress I am not denying the phenomenon has occurred. The world has warmed since 1680, the nadir of a cool period called the Little Ice Age (LIA) that has generally continued to the present. These climate changes are well within natural variability and explained quite easily by changes in the sun. But there is nothing unusual going on. Since I obtained my doctorate in climatology from the University of London, Queen Mary College, England my career has spanned two climate cycles. Temperatures declined from 1940 to 1980 and in the early 1970's global cooling became the consensus. This proves that consensus is not a scientific fact. By the 1990's temperatures appeared to have reversed and Global Warming became the consensus. It appears I'll witness another cycle before retiring, as the major mechanisms and the global temperature trends now indicate a cooling. http://www.canadafreepress.com/2007/global-warming020507.htm http://www.canadafreepress.com/2007/global-warming020507.htm This evidence is enough to support this very simple statement: Not all climatologists share a consensus that Global Warming is a man-made phenomenon. Nevertheless, I am sorry to hear about the Crichton's loss. My dad had cancer and I can relate to the hardships.
Tichy 18y ago
I faintly remember discussing another Crichton article of the same gist on HN? While I did not make it to the end, I feel there are two strategies at work in this article: A) Talk so much that your opponent loses the ability to focus and becomes vulnerable for injection of any meme you slip into the speech. B) Draw random analogies and take advantage of the flaw of the human brain, that is "addicted" to drawing analogies if there are none. Because ultimately he says "look, there were false things that were believed by a lot of people. Global warming is believed by a lot of people, therefore it must be false". That is simply a logic error. I wonder if Crichton was aware of that (and since he was intelligent, I suppose he was), because if so, I consider the article a disgusting, dishonest attempt at manipulation.
- dejb 18y ago
  As most good story tellers are he was surely a skilled manipulator of human thought and emotion.
Prrometheus 18y ago
Ya'll are a smart crowd. What do you say to the argument that being skeptical about anthropogenic Global Warming is like being skeptical about gravity or evolution?
- 1gor 18y ago
  I say it is a silly argument.
nazgulnarsil 18y ago
this is really depressing. are all of you asleep at the wheel? this essay is NOT ABOUT GLOBAL WARMING. global warming is only the latest in a long line of scientific studies that have become corrupted due to the influence of politics. The details of the current case are not important. Whether or not anthropogenic global warming is true is not important. What is important is the way scientists are behaving. If scientists are reduced to squabbling children as soon as there is some blood in the water what hope does the rest of humanity have? This essay is one of genuine concern over the direction of humanity. And as the best hope we have for a rational future, concern over the direction of science.
- olavk 18y ago
  He does take sides in the debate though, by framing Lomborg vs. Scientific American as Galileo vs. The Church. Since we know Galileo was right, the reader is of course supposed to assume that Lomborg will also turn out to be right in the face of blind dogma. Therefore Crichton doesn't have to address the actual criticism towards Lomborg. However if Lomborgs book is indeed bad science, then the strong rebuttal from scientfic circles is fair. By the whole framing of the issue Crichton imples that it is SA and the "consensus" which is politicized. However Lomborg is himself a political figure (advisor for the right-wing Danish goverment in environmental matters). That does not make him wrong, but it implies we have to look at the actual content of the rebuttal to determine who has the better case.

53 points by gaika 18y ago

I had always wondered how that whole global warming thing happened.

aston 18y ago

Oddly enough, I was at this speech. I left with a lot more respect for Crichton as a scientific thinker, and I almost read the book he was publicizing at the time, Prey.

Prrometheus 18y ago
Being a libertarian is good practice for developing this kind of skepticism, as governments often use specious statistics to support their current agenda. Second-hand smoke is one such area, as Crichton mentions. Anti-drug campaigns are also horrible for pulling numbers out of thin air.
- davidw 18y ago
  It's also good to be skeptical of libertarians denying externalities:-)
  - corentin 18y ago
    Libertarians don't deny externalities; they just recognize that some of them can't be measured.
    - dejb 18y ago
      Just because something can't be accurately measured using current technology doesn't mean it doesn't exist.
      - corentin 18y ago
        Which is what I just said...
        dejb 18y ago
        We all seem to be in furious agreement then as that was what the parent post to yours also said.
  - Prrometheus 18y ago
    As a student of economics, I am quite aware of the phenomena of market failure. However, the question to be asked before imposing a new regulation is not "is there a market failure?. Rather, we should ask "is the new regulation likely to do more good than harm?" The central insight of the Public Choice school of economics is that governments are composed of people, and like all people they respond to incentives. Public Choice is widely respected in the Economics profession, though it is generally ignored in public debates. Rather, people have a tendency to assume that the government is composed of perfect angels who will optimally address whatever externalities they are tasked with fixing. There is room for a "good governance" libertarianism, composed solely of economic arguments and with no moral arguments, that would oppose more than 50% of what modern governments do.

jcl 18y ago

He makes some good points, but I think he exaggerates his evidence. In particular, while the Drake equation and TTAPS equation both have unknown terms, at least some of the TTAPS equation terms can be estimated through observation and experimentation -- a far cry from "none of the variables can be determined. None at all." Insisting that a line of inquiry be abandoned simply because it is difficult to measure exact values seems contrary to the investigative spirit of science. Of course, Crichton is correct that we should not be drawing firm conclusions from fuzzy numbers. Likewise, just because many scientists share a consensus about something doesn't mean they are necessarily wrong; scientists share a consensus on the ineffectiveness of Laetrile, the relative harmlessness of aspartame, and the unlikelihood of cell phones causing cancer. These things are hard to prove absolutely, and may even be incorrect in specific circumstances, but in absence of better evidence, a consensus is the best we can have. I found this juxtaposition funny: There is no shortage of other examples. In the 1920s in America, tens of thousands of people, mostly poor, were dying of a disease called pellagra. [...evidence of pellagra as dietary problem...] They continued to deny it until the 1920s. Also this one: When he said it wasn't enough, he put the critics' essays on his web page and answered them in detail. Scientific American threatened copyright infringement and made him take the pages down. [...] Speeches contained on this site are the property of Michael Crichton and may not be reproduced, copied, edited, published, transmitted or uploaded in any way without express permission.

jfornear 18y ago
I keep hearing people/journalists say scientists share a consensus, but a simple google query "global warming climatologist" gives you: 1. Climatologists (scientists who study climate) have analyzed the global warming that has occurred since the late 1800's. A small number of scientists argue that the increase in greenhouse gases has not made a measurable difference in the temperature. They say that natural processes could have caused global warming. Those processes include increases in the energy emitted (given off) by the sun. http://www.nasa.gov/worldbook/global_warming_worldbook.html http://www.nasa.gov/worldbook/global_warming_worldbook.html (I know I picked quotes carefully, but that is irrelevant to my argument.) 2. Believe it or not, Global Warming is not due to human contribution. I was as opposed to the threats of impending doom global cooling engendered as I am to the threats made about Global Warming. Let me stress I am not denying the phenomenon has occurred. The world has warmed since 1680, the nadir of a cool period called the Little Ice Age (LIA) that has generally continued to the present. These climate changes are well within natural variability and explained quite easily by changes in the sun. But there is nothing unusual going on. Since I obtained my doctorate in climatology from the University of London, Queen Mary College, England my career has spanned two climate cycles. Temperatures declined from 1940 to 1980 and in the early 1970's global cooling became the consensus. This proves that consensus is not a scientific fact. By the 1990's temperatures appeared to have reversed and Global Warming became the consensus. It appears I'll witness another cycle before retiring, as the major mechanisms and the global temperature trends now indicate a cooling. http://www.canadafreepress.com/2007/global-warming020507.htm http://www.canadafreepress.com/2007/global-warming020507.htm This evidence is enough to support this very simple statement: Not all climatologists share a consensus that Global Warming is a man-made phenomenon. Nevertheless, I am sorry to hear about the Crichton's loss. My dad had cancer and I can relate to the hardships.

Tichy 18y ago

I faintly remember discussing another Crichton article of the same gist on HN? While I did not make it to the end, I feel there are two strategies at work in this article: A) Talk so much that your opponent loses the ability to focus and becomes vulnerable for injection of any meme you slip into the speech. B) Draw random analogies and take advantage of the flaw of the human brain, that is "addicted" to drawing analogies if there are none. Because ultimately he says "look, there were false things that were believed by a lot of people. Global warming is believed by a lot of people, therefore it must be false". That is simply a logic error. I wonder if Crichton was aware of that (and since he was intelligent, I suppose he was), because if so, I consider the article a disgusting, dishonest attempt at manipulation.

dejb 18y ago
As most good story tellers are he was surely a skilled manipulator of human thought and emotion.

Prrometheus 18y ago

Ya'll are a smart crowd. What do you say to the argument that being skeptical about anthropogenic Global Warming is like being skeptical about gravity or evolution?

1gor 18y ago
I say it is a silly argument.

nazgulnarsil 18y ago

this is really depressing. are all of you asleep at the wheel? this essay is NOT ABOUT GLOBAL WARMING. global warming is only the latest in a long line of scientific studies that have become corrupted due to the influence of politics. The details of the current case are not important. Whether or not anthropogenic global warming is true is not important. What is important is the way scientists are behaving. If scientists are reduced to squabbling children as soon as there is some blood in the water what hope does the rest of humanity have? This essay is one of genuine concern over the direction of humanity. And as the best hope we have for a rational future, concern over the direction of science.

olavk 18y ago
He does take sides in the debate though, by framing Lomborg vs. Scientific American as Galileo vs. The Church. Since we know Galileo was right, the reader is of course supposed to assume that Lomborg will also turn out to be right in the face of blind dogma. Therefore Crichton doesn't have to address the actual criticism towards Lomborg. However if Lomborgs book is indeed bad science, then the strong rebuttal from scientfic circles is fair. By the whole framing of the issue Crichton imples that it is SA and the "consensus" which is politicized. However Lomborg is himself a political figure (advisor for the right-wing Danish goverment in environmental matters). That does not make him wrong, but it implies we have to look at the actual content of the rebuttal to determine who has the better case.